


roost

by fishycorvid



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Drabble, Gen, Missing Scene, Pre-Canon, Raven's Roost, Second Person, Thinkpiece-y, but like as a literary device, post Stolen Century, short fic, ya know?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-17 09:15:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16092611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishycorvid/pseuds/fishycorvid
Summary: you know that if you looked away, you would forget this man's face.





	roost

**Author's Note:**

> listen this is kinda a dumb little drabble but i love chance encounters and i love voidfish-induced cognitive dissonance so pls enjoy this if you also like those things!!

You are in Raven’s Roost. This is where you were born. This is where you fought. This is where you grew, and learned, and made friends, and carved wood into rough shapes until one day they weren’t so rough at all, and a gruff but kind man takes you on as an apprentice and you fall in love with his daughter and you marry her, slip a hand-carved gold and wood wedding ring on her finger and kiss her in front of a crowd of genuinely happy people and that night you laugh and sing and talk until the sun peeks up over the horizon and you think, without a doubt in your mind, _home._

You are in Raven’s Roost, and this is where you love and love and love. 

You are wandering through the marketplace, hand in hand with Julia, and your focus is everywhere and nowhere. The sun is bright and flashes in your eyes. The music of countless bards mingles in the air. Columns of residential areas and businesses and workshops loom over your heads, not imposing but simply present. The air smells of baked goods, sweet and savory, overlapping in ways that are equal parts pleasant and strange. You can feel her hand, the wood of her ring digging into your fingers, and it is a reminder; you turn your head to press a kiss to her cheek and she laughs, eyes crinkling closed, and she pulls you in by the back of your neck to kiss you proper, in the middle of this flowing, shifting, conversing mass of people. 

It is when you pull away, a smile fully curling back your lips to show crooked teeth, that you catch sight of this… this _guy._ You’ve never seen him before, but you feel like maybe you should have. 

 

He’s an elven man, perching himself up on a stagecoach that breaks straight through the middle of the crowd. A small group is gathered around him, as if magnetized by the sound of his voice and his flashing grin and his bright, multicolored eyes. His hands flutter in the air with a practiced ease, more dance than nervous tic, and you watch magic spark from his fingertips and catch in the black holes of his eyes. 

And all of that is fine, but when you focus in on all of his face, you just— something simply doesn’t work. 

This sun elf, calling out to the crowd and shooting off flashy spells and doing a bunch of flips that really shouldn’t be possible, considering he’s in a carriage in the middle of a crowded marketplace. He’s this whirl of energy, and when he finally stills, warbling voice going theatrically soft, you still can’t focus on him; it’s like he’s blurring in front of your eyes. You know, innately, that if you looked away now, you would forget him in an instant, and your heart coils around your throat, snakelike. 

The voice comes back, loud and brash and showy, and it feels familiar but wrong, wrong, wrong. “And that, my friends, was Sizzle It Up!” The crowd cheers, and he flings some things into the group that you can’t quite see from this far away, to intensified shouts of glee and praise. The horses drawing his cart paw impatiently at the ground and jolt the stagecoach forward. The elf yelps and steadies himself on the counter, giggling a little, and it’s— it’s—

You stumble backward, and you drop Julia’s hand, and you can taste blood in your mouth. 

All of a sudden, the late-morning sun seems brighter. It glints off your eyes painfully, and you exhale, sharp and loud to your own ears. 

“Magnus?” someone asks, and you press your palm to your forehead until you can feel the bones of your hand against your skull, like your flesh was never there at all. 

You are in Raven’s Roost. This is where you were born. This is where you fought. This is where you—

When you open your eyes again (when did you close them?), Julia has pulled you into an alleyway, warm hands on your face. “Are you okay?” she asks, brow furrowed, and you love her. “Your lip is bleeding,” she murmurs, and sweeps a thumb across your cheek, brushes dark, metallic liquid away from your mouth. 

Where you fought— where you grew— where you learned—

_Love and love and love._

“Yeah, I just—” you try to glance around her, back to the marketplace, but the stagecoach is just— gone. So is the elf. 

You feel a little nauseous. 

“Yeah. I’m okay, Jules.” 

Her lips pull sideways, and you kiss the corner of her downturned mouth in a reassurance that calms neither of you, but she smiles nonetheless and lets you lead her back into the square. 

The day seems a little less bright, maybe. The mass of people a little more muted. And it’s a funny thing, you think, because you can hardly even remember what the elf looked like now. The cut on your lip from where your teeth dug in too deep is the only proof he ever existed. 

You are now, as you always were, in Raven's Roost. You feel like that should hold more weight than it does. 

Mostly, it works. But, sometimes, it doesn’t. 

In a marketplace, far away from her home, a blue-robed woman writes something down in a worn leather journal, snaps it shut, and disappears into the crowd.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks sm for reading!! feel free 2 find me on tumblr (@chaosssy) if you wanna talk about taz, and leave a kudos or comment if you feel inclined. it really does just make me happy that you read it! thanks again <333


End file.
